In this section, you will get an overview of just some of the available Azure virtual machine settings. You can configure all of these settings by using the Azure portal, PowerShell, Azure CLI, or the Windows Admin Center.
The Azure Virtual Machine Settings page includes the following settings:
Networking The Networking section (shown in Figure 12.25) allows you to set up and configure the Inbound Rules, Outbound Rules, Application Security Groups, and Load Balancing settings. Setting Inbound and Outbound rules can help protect your network by stopping unauthorized traffic.
FIGURE 12.25 VM Networking settings
Connect The Connect section allows you to configure which protocols that you want to use to connect to the virtual machine. Here you can specify the protocols (RDP, SSH, and Bastion) that you want to use to connect to the VM.
Windows Admin Center The Windows Admin Center is a utility that allows you to manage servers, clients, clustering, and Azure VMs. The Windows Admin Center can be deployed in two different ways.
You can download the Windows Admin Center for free directly from Microsoft and then install it onto a server or a Windows client (Windows 10/11).
Also, Azure allows you to use the Windows Admin Center directly from Azure. There is no need to install the Windows Admin Center into Azure. By clicking the Windows Admin Center link, you can configure your settings and connect to your servers. Disks The Disks setting section allows you to create and manage your virtual machine hard drives. The Disks settings let you attach an existing or create a new virtual hard disk. You can also click the Additional Settings link to configure the virtual hard disk encryption.
Size One of the best advantages of using Azure is the ability to quickly and easily change the size of your VM based on the needs for CPU, network, or disk performance (see Figure 12.26). Remember, the more resources that you add to the VM, the more it’s going to cost your organization.
FIGURE 12.26 VM Size settings
Microsoft Defender for Cloud Microsoft Defender for Cloud constantly examines the configuration of your virtual machines to identify possible security vulnerabilities and recommends actions to help solve the issues.
Advisor Recommendations The Azure VM Advisor delivers relevant best practices so that an administrator can improve reliability, security, and performance, and reduce costs. You can target a specific server, resource, resource group, or subscription to verify that the servers and services are running to get the best performance. Access the Advisor through the Azure portal, the Azure CLI, or the Advisor API.
Extensions + Applications Azure Virtual Machine Extensions are smaller applications that run on Azure VMs. Azure Virtual Machine Extensions allow post- deployment configuration and automation of the Azure VMs. Azure has many different extensions that allow you to set up configuring, monitoring, security, and utility applications. You just need to provide mandatory parameters. You can view the available extensions by choosing a VM, then selecting Extensions from the left menu.
Azure VM extensions can be managed using the Azure CLI, PowerShell, Resource Manager templates, and the Azure portal. To try an extension, go to the Azure portal, select the Custom Script Extension, then pass in a command or script to run the extension.
